


Cold and Deep with Bite Beneath

by orangecrow



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Mermaid, Angst, Arranged Marriage, Broody Derek, M/M, Romance, Slow Build, mermaid!stiles
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-03-31
Updated: 2014-04-13
Packaged: 2018-01-17 16:14:16
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 20,787
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1394044
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orangecrow/pseuds/orangecrow
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Derek Hale returns to Beacon Hills to deal with his family's estate and finds an unwilling resident in the preserve's lake.<br/>(This story is not currently being updated. Apologies!)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Howdy folks! I thought I'd share the mermaid!AU that I've had rattling around in my head with everyone. As of right now, I have no beta reader, so all mistakes are my own. (But if you would like to volunteer, or kindly point out any errors, please contact me at my [tumblr](http://orange-crow.tumblr.com/).) This story is rated Explicit for future chapters, but will be tagged with applicable tags as it goes to avoid disappointing anyone. Please enjoy!

_Plunk_. 

The surface of the dark lake makes a gulping noise as it swallows the rock; black water ripples only slightly and stills after a few moments. Derek runs his thumb over another smooth specimen before winding his arm back and pitching it toward the glassy surface of the water.

_Plunk_.

The lake swallows this one, too. Derek watches the surface of the water through the din, disappointed when the ripples don't quite make it to the jagged crust of ice ringing the bank.

It'd been years since he'd been here last. Before New York - before the fire, even. Aside from the thick covering of snow and ice, though, the lake remained as it ever was, still and dark. Sixteen, the last time he visited. Still a little scrawny then, and rebellious, like teenagers are.

_Plunk_.

Derek sighs to himself and blindly reaches to scoop up another rock. He cringes when his fingers close around snow instead and he swipes his hand across the knee of his jeans. The blanketing silence of the clearing baits at Derek's thoughts like a bulldog, and he wavers between serenity and agitation.

They'd come back to Beacon Hills four days ago, to the coldest winter there in the past hundred years. Laura had piled their motley pack into her hideous SUV and Derek had followed behind in the Camaro on the most ill-conceived road trip ever. He'd spent half the time sick to his stomach and the other half binge-eating Bugles, the whole time wishing he could just turn the car around and head back to New York.

Three and a half days later, however, he found himself back in his childhood home, wanting to be anywhere but there.

The past six years had not been kind to the Hale house, and people with nothing but kindness in their hearts and praise upon their tongues might generously describe it as "ramshackle." The blue paint on the shutters was peeling in the places where it hadn't been burned away. The stairs leading up to the back porch had caved in, revealing the den of a family of raccoons. Inside, half of the floorboards in the living room had warped under a hole in the ceiling. But as soon as he and Laura had entered the mostly untouched kitchen, he'd heard her make this _noise_ , before she declared "We can fix this."

He'd barely been able to swallow past the guilt in his throat, since.

Derek rubs at his throat roughly at the thought, scratching at the scruff on his chin. The quiet of the scenery seems stark in contrast to the volume in his life an hour ago, during his shouting match with his sister. The gloom of the lake suits his black mood, and the snow blanketing the surrounding pines even seems dim. Even the river feeding the lake is stilled, dammed by ice. So it's just him and the sound of his breathing.

Storming out on Laura didn't make him feel any better about all of this. But talking definitely made him feel worse. He could teach a class on avoidance.

He hefts another rock up into his hand, bigger and heavier, this time. It takes a fraction more strength to lob it all the way across the bank and toward the mirror finish of the lake's center, but a primal sort of satisfaction settles over Derek when it crashes through the surface of the water, swallowing the stone as easily as it had swallowed him when he was sixteen and stupid.

_Plunk_.

Silence fills the clearing again, and Derek thinks that maybe he should man up and go back to the motel where they've been staying. _Laura's going to hate me for siding with Peter_ , he thinks, dragging his back off of the flat boulder he'd been leaning up against. But he thinks he can deal with that kind of hate, at least.

_Whap._

Derek's head jerks up, eye drawn to the lake's center once more. The water's surface turbulent and wild, broken by something shiny and silver. He gets to his feet, edging closer to the icy bank. As the water begins to still once more, his ears strain and his claws dig into his palms, muscles in his back tense.

A bit of ice drifts free and spins lazily along the water's surface. Derek watches it for a few moments as his breathing evens back out.

When the naked torso of a boy breaks the surface, gasping and struggling, Derek almost falls backward in surprise.

The panic in the boy's wide eyes seems all too familiar to Derek, and he stares dumbly as the boy's arms flail outward, hitting nothing but frigid water and sending waves crashing against the lake's edges. The sound of wheezing, panting breaths and splashing is deafening until the boy slips back under, water stilling once more.

Derek jerks forward across the ice, beckoned until he's scrabbling on his claws and knees up to the edge of the water. He can't bring himself to dive in, instead staring at the glossy ink of the lake, frozen and waiting for any sign of life.

Ten feet from him, the surface breaks again, and the boy is clawing at the edge of the ice layer. The muscles in his arms strain to hold him in place as he coughs and heaves for breath. Derek carefully edges toward the man, wary of the ice under his boots. The boy's got his face mushed up against the ice, nose red and flaring as he drags in oxygen. His eyes are closed and his lashes fan above his cheekbones, wet and dark. He's almost _pretty_ , Derek thinks to himself in his panicked haze. Long fingers dug into the ice, lips pink against his pale face, form long and lean and altogether unlikely.

The ice squeaks in protest under Derek's shoes as he kneels in front of the man. Derek tenses, but reaches for the man's forearms anyway. "Hey. Are you alright? We've got to get you out of there," he says, voice rough as he tries to sound like he might while soothing an injured bunny. "C'mon. I'm Derek. We have to get you to the hospital." _Shit_. His car's all the way back at the house. This kid's probably going to wonder how the hell Derek carried him all the way to his car from all the way out here in the middle of the preserve. If he remembers anything at all.

The man's arms are surprisingly warm when Derek's fingers close around them; they're clammy, but not as frigid as the winter might dictate. Brown eyes fly open with a startled yelp, and the boy yanks himself backward, slithering free of Derek's grip. Before Derek can go after him, he's dipped back under the water again, bubbles trailing behind him. Without thinking, Derek plunges his hands in after, the cold sharply kicking the breath from his lungs.

Cracks web out under his knees and water laps at the front of his jacket before he has a firm grip around he boy's lanky arms again. He yanks upward, flinging himself backwards in the same movement and onto the rocky bank, leaving the boy gasping and grasping on the ice once more.

Derek takes a moment to retrieve his wits, wiping a wet hand over his face and getting grit in his beard. He stands slowly, uncomfortable with how shaky his legs seem. His whole front is slightly damp in a way that might be downright deadly if he weren't a werewolf. But as it is, he's just a little miserable and shivery in a way he won't admit to later. He cranes his neck to get a closer look at the sopping wet tangle of limbs he'd just dragged from the water like driftwood. He's got to get him to a hospital before the kid starts risking losing a limb or four. He's about to offer his coat to the naked man, fingers already at the zipped collar, when he realizes the man isn't exactly naked. Not quite.

 

***

 

Stiles hauls himself up with his arms. He coughs and indignantly sputters again, shamefully spitting out water and feeling like he'd swallowed the whole ocean. His muscles strain and he grunts, wondering _how the hell do girls manage to make this look easy?_ He twists his tail under him and settles on his flank, one quivery arm supporting his weight as he hacks again. Once he's sure his lungs and stomach are done rebelling against him, he wipes the back of his arm across his mouth, scales dragging against his lips.

He needs a moment before he can even _look_ at the surface-dweller. He's caught between shock and curiosity. One minute, he'd been swimming along, minding his own business, and the next he's choking, running out of air like a newborn. And then he's being hauled out of the water by the burly arms of a fisherman. It's like something out of an old crone's tale, it's so cliched.

He casts his gaze around, taking in the scenery. He's sure it makes him look mysterious, too, after all the coughing. Come to think of it, he isn't exactly sure how he'd managed to swim up here. There's barely any trace of salt in these waters. He'd noticed, having swallowed several mouthfuls. And he's positive this little lake isn't anywhere close to being on course to the Gulf of Mexico, even coming down the inland channels.

His dad's going to kill him. He's probably going to be incredibly late. He'll never live it down. Late to his own wedding. Pre-wedding. Still, his dad will kill him.

Finally, he looks up at the surface-dweller. He'd almost forgotten about him, standing there so quietly. The man is _looming_ above him, brows furrowed in the same kind of shock the girls often described in sailors. Stiles can't help but waggle his own eyebrows at the fisherman.

"Hey there. Don't suppose you could point me in the direction of the nearest ocean, eh, big guy?" Stiles asks, flicking his fins in the water for added effect.

There's a long pause before the surface-dweller speaks. "What the hell are you doing in our lake?" His voice is a soft sort of growl that reminds Stiles of shark skin.

"Ah, is this your lake? I hadn't noticed. It's a very nice lake. And I will be happy to leave you to it once I... a-hah!" He sees the river that must have carried him so far inland, the mouth stretching wide across the far bank. Stiles tilts to one side and dives headlong back into the still water with a dramatic splash. Maybe if he swims hard he'll make up the time riding the currents. He's not even sure how much time he needs to make back; he could have sworn he'd been closer to sea.

He's halfway across the lake before a sinking sensation settles in his stomach. When he stills, he can't feel the movement of water across his scales, and he knows that that can only mean one thing. Gliding closer to the opposite bank, he reaches another shelf of ice. He folds his arms across it and listens intently. The only sound comes from the fisherman's feet in the snow.

"It's frozen shut," he man supplies, voice a fun mixture of gloom and wariness. Stiles nods, momentarily lost. "You're a... merman?" Stiles nods again, a little hysterical chuckle bubbling out of his mouth.

"You don't sound as surprised as most surface-dwellers," Stiles says with a sidelong look, studying the dark haired man. And it's true; he does look terribly calm for someone in his situation. Green-blue eyes study Stiles for several long moments and Stiles begins to feel uncomfortable, licking his lips nervously.

The man shrugs. "Aren't you cold?" He asks.

 "Cold? What? No!" Stiles scrunches his nose in confusion. Because _really_? "You meet a merman for the first time and you ask him if he's _cold?_ Aren't you going to ask for three wishes? Or for my hand in marriage? I'd almost give you points for creativity, but, again, _really?_ "

The surface-dweller _growls_ at him. Straight up. Stiles has the decency to swim backwards a few inches, tail twitching beneath the surface in agitation. And so maybe it's not the best idea to bait the angry, hairy fisherman with arms thicker than both of Stiles's put together. He knows what people can do to merpeople. He hears the stories. But he never really got full marks for staying on task, anyway.

"Do you grant wishes?" The man doesn't even seem to give the other suggestion any thought.

"Well, no. But you could have at least _asked_." Stiles rolls his eyes and glides a little further out into the lake when the man makes a strangled sort of rage noise. "Besides, you don't look like you need any wishes, buddy." _I mean, just look at him_ , Stiles thinks. With shoulders like that, he's sure the fella could get more than a couple girls to take off their seashell bras for him.

The man sneers at him and doesn't answer, instead backing away from the water's edge a few paces. "Hey! Wait! I- Look, I'm sorry. Don't leave?" Stiles wishes he was a little better at watching his mouth, at paying attention. But he really couldn't help it. Scrawny guys like him live on sarcasm and the skins of their teeth.

His feet still and Stiles feels a surge of hope. "I'm Stiles," he offers, grinning. The man grunts in reply and Stiles presses forward. "And you said your name was... Derek, right?" Stiles beams in a way he hopes is charming. "I'm gonna be straight with you here. I don't have very much experience when it comes to humans." Derek's eyebrows draw together in their own little silent _Oh, really?_ and Stiles impresses himself by continuing on. "And I'm willing to bet that you've probably never seen a mermaid. But the thing is, is that we really, really try not to be seen. Not since, like, the nineteen hundreds. You get me?"

Derek doesn't answer him, so Stiles hopes he does. "Anyway. I'd just really, _really_ appreciate it if you could maybe help me on my merry way, and then never speak of this to another living soul. Like, ever." By the time he finishes, he's playing with an iridescent silver scale freckling his arm, almost coy.

The fisherman grunts and Stiles sighs, resignedly. "And I guess just one wish wou- Wait. What? Really? You really won't tell?" He scrambles forward on the icy shelf, earnestly trying to see truth in the man's eyes.

"It's fine. I won't." And Stiles nearly whoops with joy, losing his balance on the ice and flopping backwards into the water and not even caring. He swims a lap around the murky lake before surfacing again and treating Derek to another grin.

"Thank you! I'd kiss you on the mouth if my virtue wasn't promised to another," he jokes.

Derek rolls his eyes at him before turning away again, this time to look at the mouth of the river. Stiles follows in the water, inspecting underneath the ice at Derek's behest. It was well and truly dammed; rocks, debris, and silt all held together by a thick coating of ice. Stiles tears at the first jagged rock he can close his hands around, swimming backward, tail thrashing, to no avail.

"No luck down here," he says. Derek's testing the surface of the river further upstream with a foot, and if Stiles has to guess, he doubts that the deep frown on the man's face is a good sign.

Derek returns, shaking his head after several minutes and Stiles feels the beat of his heart grow a little manic.

"Calm down," Derek's saying in a softer tone than before, more like the one he'd used when he thought Stiles was drowning. "It's the coldest winter Beacon Hills has had on record, but it's still California. Give it a few days and it'll start flowing again. There's no way you can get back up that river like it is, anyway."

Stiles shakes his head, the water around him lapping at the ice shelf. "I don't have a few days," he insists. "I'm supposed to be halfway to Panama by now."

Derek snorts and crosses his arms across his broad chest in a way that assures Stiles that both he - and the river - won't be budging any time soon. Stiles groans dramatically and flails backward into the water. He needs a moment.

Under the water, he counts to ten slowly, blowing a bubble of air from his nose with each number. It's dark and calming underneath the water, and when he returns to the surface he feels slightly better equipped to handle the situation.

Derek's still standing there, _staring_ at him. Stiles guesses it makes sense with him being an amazingly mysterious aquatic creature and all, but the stare is really less fascinated and more pointedly aggressive and Stiles is kind of glad to be neck deep in icy water.

He opens his mouth to speak when Derek interrupts him. "Well. Good luck with that. You know the way out."

Stiles gapes at the man, who's now turning to leave. "Hey! Wait!" He screeches, feeling like a broken record. "You said you'd help me."

"And I did. But there's nothing else _I_ can do." Stiles wants to splash the smug look off the man's beautiful beardy face. "I can't control the weather."

And the calm, logical part of Stiles's brain knows this to be true. He knows that he's asking a lot of a complete stranger. A surface-dweller, no less. But he's still _disappointed_. Disappointed and devastated, disillusioned and frantic, all at once. It's a manic mixture that goes straight to the more impulsive side of Stiles's brain. The side that told him that it was a good idea to try and keep a baby shark as a pet when he was seven. The side that convinced his best friend that girls would be totally impressed if they got squid ink tattoos (Stiles had chickened out at the last minute). So he makes a rude gesture that probably doesn't translate all that well to the man standing on the ground before him and mutters venomously.

"Are all two-leggers like you? Heads too high in the clouds? I guess it must hurt if you all stoop down once in a while to help other people." His voice sounds more hurt and less sarcastic than he means for it to, but it doesn't matter. He sweeps his tail across the surface and dives down into the deep, dark embrace of the lake's center, hoping he got the stupid man wet on the way.

 

***

 

Derek snarls and gnashes his teeth together unsurprised when a fang pricks at his lip. By the time he licks it, it's healed over already. He spins on his heel and stalks away, brushing lake water from the front of his jacket and cursing all other manners of supernatural beings as he goes. 

His mother had been right when he was sixteen, and she was still right today. The lake is a terrible place, and he should never go there.

He doesn't even notice he's running all the way back until he sees a low-lying tree limb rushing toward his face. He dodges out of the way and slows a little, getting his bearings. He feels a little ridiculous, but shoves the thought away, focusing instead on the feel of the hard earth under his feet, made unstable in places by snow and frost.

_This is stupid._ He tells himself as he slows to a walk. He's running from something that can't even chase him and he feels more and more foolish by the second. He's a werewolf. A born werewolf, at that. He can count on one claw-tipped hand the times he's actually had to run from anything in his life, each time faced with something far more terrible than a little mermaid in a lake near his own charred-out house.

He shakes his head and walks down the overgrown dirt driveway along the side of the Hale house. His Camaro's parked where he left it, and he pulls open the door. He sits there for a few moments without reaching for his keys. Instead, he stares at the sun visor for a little, head tilted back. He hasn't needed it since getting to Beacon Hills; every day a little grey, sun covered by icy clouds. It makes the house look more shabby and squat, crouching next to his car like a wounded beast.

His phone rings and startles him. Cursing, he answers it. "What?"

"What's the matter with you?" Comes the snotty reply. Erica.

"Hit my hand reaching for the phone. Fuck. Nevermind. What do you want?"

Derek can practically hear the eyeroll that accompanies her huff through the phone's speaker. "We've been trying to call you, you know."

He didn't know. "I left my phone in my car," he mumbles. "Sorry." And he's a little surprised by the amount of guilt he finds in his voice.

"Yeah, whatever," Erica says in her casual caustic-but-not-mean tone. "We're getting dinner soon. Fried chicken," she sounds a little disgusted. Must not be her night to pick. "We were wondering if you were coming back." The way she says 'we' implies that she mostly means Laura, and that the pack is concerned as a result.

He grunts to show he's thinking about it. He's learned from others that a phone conversations with him are a game of "Dropped Call, or Normal Derek Silence?"

"Well if you aren't, I'm going to say that you are and eat your share, ok?" Bless her. "By the way," she continues, tone sobering for a moment, "the lawyers stopped by again today. Seem antsy."

Derek doesn't know what to say to that, and is glad that Erica doesn't seem to really need an answer from him. "Save me a piece," he says instead.

"Don't push it, Hale." And she's hanging up.

Derek tosses the phone back into the passenger's seat and frowns at the road-trip mess still left in his car. During their chat, he'd picked a water bottle clean of its label and has to shove the confetti into an abandoned plastic bag on the floorboard to deal with later. He fishes a still sealed bag of Bugles out of the debris and frowns deeply.

He's halfway across the yard before he knows it, junk food still clasped in his hand. It's a little eerie, how familiar it all still is, while overgrown and gloomy.

His mother had loved to garden. Flowers, herbs, vegetables - she grew everything save for maybe wolfsbane itself. Derek finds that some of it's still there in the same neat little plots she'd kept when he was a kid. He'd even helped her till new ones in the back. Everything's wild and overgrown and choked with weeds, but Derek can tell where deer have been pulling up carrots and he can see the frost-coated remnants of autumn cornstalks.

The garden shed had gone untouched by fire, so far from the house. The barn-red paint sun faded and weathered but cheery, despite. Derek is grateful for his werewolf strength when it comes to the rusted latch, though. When the door creaks open, everything is exactly where it had been left six years prior.

He gathers what he needs and shuts the door back reverently, trekking back through the reserve with arms full of tools and corn-based snack products.

When he reaches the lake again, there's no sign of the mermaid. Merman. Whatever. He dumps his armful of tools near the mouth of the river with a clatter and goes to survey the ice once more.

He's careful. He hates water, and has ever since his last encounter with this very lake. But the surface is well and truly frozen, ice several inches thick at its thinnest points. Even if it were bright and sunny for the next week, Derek doubts there would be enough melt for the river to start flowing again.

A splash meets his ears and Derek turns toward the noise, catching a glimpse of a long silver tail disappearing back into the water. It was as lithe as the rest of him, and reminded Derek almost as much of a dolphin's tail as a fish's - less frilly than he would have imagined. He doesn't realize he's still staring until he notices water lapping at his shoes and a pair of brown eyes staring back.

He clears his throat and doesn't think he's ever felt this awkward.

"Don't make this weird, man." And Derek figures that mermaids must have superhuman grudge-hiding abilities until Stiles _grins_ at him.

"I brought some shovels and stuff. But I think this is going to take a while." Derek scoops up a trowel and sets it down on the ice next to Stiles's arm, admiring the glimmer of scales on the backs of his forearms because he can't help it.

Stiles heaves a put upon sigh and rests his chin on the ice without so much as a flinch. He ignores the offered tool and picks at the bank instead. "If there's no helping it... I guess the party will have to wait."

Derek doesn't comment and rolls his shoulders, picking up a larger shovel to deal with the mouth of the river itself. "How did you wind up in our lake anyway? Aren't mermaids supposed to live in the ocean?" If he has to help this mouthy creature, he might as well get something out of it. Even if he did agree never to tell a living soul about the existence of said mouthy creature.

"Merman," Stiles corrects him with an annoyed flick of his tail, sending chunks of ice spinning into the center of the lake. "And we migrate from salt water to fresh water."

"Like salmon?"

"Wh- No! Not like a sa- Well. I guess so, yes. But also not at all." Stiles looks half insulted and half impressed. Derek guesses there are worse fish to be compared to.

"You're not going to start spawning in my lake, are you?" Derek's joking, but he does it so rarely and with such a straight face that he's almost afraid the boy might have a seizure, the way he's flailing and churning up the water.

"No! Ew, gross. That's awful. And for your information I'm trying to get my scaly ass back to the ocean for my _wedding_ , you prick." He crosses his arms over his bare chest and looks awfully smug for someone in his position, soaking wet, half-naked, and apparently running late for his own wedding.

"So instead of making it out to sea, you're stuck here. Some catch you make. Send her my congratulations once you're out," Derek intones darkly, chipping at the ice with his shovel.

"Hey!" Stiles points a finger at him, accusatory, but can't seem to find words to defend himself with and it's Derek's turn to look smug as he scrapes gouges into the ice.

"Aren't you a little young to be getting married, anyway? What are you, fifteen?" And Stiles clearly doesn't like that very much either, judging by the way Derek's socks are soaked by a well-aimed splash.

"I'm seventeen, jerk. And it's not that young for us. You know that surface-dweller expression 'plenty of fish in the sea?' Yeah, not exactly true. Most of our marriages are arranged before we turn twelve." Stiles finally scoops up the trowel and starts chipping at the ring of ice where it meets the river from his end.

"Seventeen and late for a wedding to a girl you've never met. We better dig faster, then," Derek quips. He knows he's not one to judge teenagers on their relationships, but it's terribly easy for him to relate to how disastrously awful they usually are. The thought of marrying someone at that age as him digging his claws into the wooden handle of the shovel as he brings it down into the ice.

His sarcasm is ignored and Stiles sighs. "She's flawless and beautiful and smart. And I totally have met her. Twice, even. It's going to be amazing," he murmurs dreamily, trowel forgotten. Derek doesn't have the heart to snap at him any more, lost in his own thoughts. Instead, he dutifully chips at the ice, losing himself in the rhythm of the activity and the burn in his arms.

By the time he notices the raw flesh of his palms itching as it knits itself back together, he's made a deep gouge in his section of the ice. A brief feeling of satisfaction washes through him before he steps back and sees how much more needs to be done. He shakes his head before wiping his bloody palms together and then scratching his beard.

"Thanks for helping me," Stiles says, behind him in the lake. He turns and finds big brown eyes studying him with seriousness. "Really. You were my only hope, man."

It's the kind of honesty Derek finds hard to swallow. He gets it from Laura and the pack from time to time, of course. But never from strangers. And he doesn't know how to respond, instead shifting uncomfortably from foot to foot. Fortunately, Stiles doesn't seem to expect a reply, already placing the trowel back up on the icy shelf he'd been leaning on before.

"I'm starving," he says, rubbing at his pale belly. "I don't figure you know where all the fish are hiding in here, do you? I haven't seen a single one."

It catches him by surprise and Derek half snorts with laughter before he can help himself. "You eat fish?"

Stiles looks at him like he's grown a furry tail and two extra heads. "Yeah. What else would I eat?"

"Seaweed?" The werewolf shrugs and sits down on the bank to catch his breath for a moment.

"We eat that too. But I'd probably die if that's all I ever ate. That stuff is about as appetizing as it looks." Stiles makes a face and gags a little for effect.

Well, isn't it just a day of discovery, then?

Derek's hand brushes over the bag of Bugles from earlier and he opens the bag, the squeak of the wrapper drawing a curious glance from the merman. "Corn won't kill you, will it?"

Stiles shrugs, looking more curious than terrified.

"I guess if it does, then I don't have to dig you out." And he's offering the bag, holding it out across the rim of ice. He winces when Stiles fishes around in the bag with a wet hand and pulls out an eager handful of crispy cones. Derek retracts the bag and munches on one thoughtfully, watching as Stiles fits the snacks over his fingertips.

"Look. Double claws." Stiles flexes his fingers, raking at the air, and Derek lifts his eyes heavenward, begging for patience. His week's just gotten longer. But at this rate, it'll be easier to steer clear of his sister.

"You're supposed to eat them." And so Stiles does, crunching loudly and looking pleased with himself.

"Taste like seawater a little. But I kind of like it." 

Derek lets him have the rest of the bag once he sees that junk food won't send him into death throes. The crisp crunching noise seems to echo around the clearing as Derek stands and wipes his hands on his jeans, taking in the sun's position low in the sky. As much as he'd like to continue to avoid Laura, he's sure she'll be out looking for him before long. Avoiding his sister is one thing, but dodging his alpha is a whole separate matter that he doesn't want to get in to. He wouldn't like her to find him at the lake, anyway. She liked it just about as much as mom did, and would probably get the wrong idea if she caught him too close to the house like this.

Derek stands and brushes snow from the seat of his jeans with a resigned noise.

"You're leaving already?" Stiles asks when he props the garden tools up against a tree, trying to keep them out of the elements without taking them all the way back to the shed. He didn't want to haul them out from by the garden every day they kept this up.

Derek grunts. "I've got to get back before my sister chews my ear off. Besides, the temperature's going to drop even further once it gets dark. It'll be easier with the sun on our side." The shovel would freeze into the ice at those temperatures.

Stiles makes an exasperated noise as Derek moves back over to collect the empty chip bag. "Fine," he moans, not sounding fine with it at all.

"If you don't like it, you can dig yourself out tonight for all I care," Derek grouses. "I didn't exactly sign on for a pet goldfish, you know. I'm doing you a favor - several favors, without any reward." It sounds meaner than he intends, and the kid probably doesn't deserve it, but Derek's been just about as nice as he's comfortable being for one day already.

"My winning smile isn't reward enough?" And winning is a generous term. It looks a little weak from where Derek's standing.

"Ugh. On second thought, you'll definitely have to dig yourself out." He means it as a joke, really. But it comes out a little too tired and bitter, and he's pretty terrible with his comedic timing to begin with. He's already wishing he'd not said anything at all by the time the last word crosses his lips.

He feels worse when panic rushes over Stiles's face and he grips Derek's coat sleeve with a claw-tipped hand. "Hey, I'm sorry, man. I didn't mean it," and there's enough raw desperation in his voice to give Derek pause. "You've gotta help me out. Please."

And he tugs on Derek's arm. It's just a little tug, innocent and pleading, but it catches Derek off guard both figuratively and literally, and he finds himself pitching forward, face-first toward the water.

His head's submerged and it feels like someone is trying to rip out his teeth. It's so cold it burns. He can't breathe and his lungs feel like wrung-out sponges. He knows it lasts mere moments, but it feels like too long by the time he yanks himself backward. He hears a yelp from in front of him but he's too busy clawing his way back onto safe, rocky ground to pay Stiles any mind.

He sits, panting and shivering like a pup for several moments before he hears a soft voice asking if he's ok. The water soaking down his front is already freezing the shirt underneath his jacket stiff. His breath comes out in jagged little mist clouds and Derek can barely look at the merman who'd just nearly drowned him again. But when he does, he knows his eyes are bright blue and he snarls at Stiles before collecting himself up off of the ground and stalking away from that accursed silent lake. 


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everyone who left a comment on the first chapter. Your words were all highly motivating, and I hope that you continue to enjoy the story!
> 
> As of right now, I have no beta reader, so all mistakes are my own. (But if you would like to volunteer, or kindly point out any errors, please contact me at my [tumblr](http://orange-crow.tumblr.com/).) This story is rated Explicit for future chapters, but will be tagged with applicable tags as it goes to avoid disappointing anyone. Please enjoy!

The air's sticky for early September. Summer shows no sign up letting up even as Halloween candy creeps onto store shelves. Everyone's torn between complaining about the heat while basking in the school's A/C and complaining about being trapped in school while the weather still lends itself to pool parties and barbecues.

Derek Hale's riding high, though. His ancient house doesn't have central air and he keeps having to sneak a second oscillating fan out of the living room every night just to stay cool while he sleeps. But that doesn't matter. He's a junior in high school now. And he's put on some muscle over the summer, no longer quite so scrawny. Laura actually looks like she has to try whenever she beats him up, lately. He thinks he might make the basketball team this year.

Newfound confidence goes to his head faster than the temperature.

Becky Bishop sits in front of him in AP English. Pale skin, tar black hair, and always smelling like strawberry lipgloss. Before this year, she never gave Derek a second look even though they'd gone to the same school since the fourth grade. This year she does, though, and that's good enough for Derek. She asks him if he wants to hang out sometime after school, casually popping her chewing gum. Derek only stutters a little bit when he tells her about the preserve where his family lives.

The preserve was an inspiring place to grow up on, especially considering that none of the Hale children could ever convince Talia Hale that they _needed_ a Nintendo 64 if they were ever not going to be complete social outcasts. There was plenty of space for impressive games of capture the flag. Ample supplies for the most expansive tree forts and secret bases. The more reckless teenagers of Beacon Hills even liked to have bonfires on the edges of the preserve. Talia didn't approve of that, but tolerated it for the family's sake.

By the time Derek turned ten, he knew the preserve like the underside of his arm. He could navigate the whole of the land by smell alone. He had his favorite spots: the garden where he helped his mom with the tomatoes, the meadow where he liked to do his teenage brooding, the ravine where he and his siblings would dare each other to jump a little further across, participating in wolfed out tussles and accusing each other of cheating.

But his mother had expressly forbade them from hanging around the lake, like something out of The Lion King. Derek assumed that it was probably because of the alcohol fueled teenagers at the bonfires. Or maybe it was because she simply worried a little more than they thought, now and then. Either way, her tone brooked no argument whenever it was brought up, and the Hale kids rarely argued.

He agrees to meet Becky there, though, because he's positive his sisters won't find them there. Being a middle brother is kind of the worst.

Derek's wearing his nicest t-shirt, nothing too impressive, but he's determined that it shows off his biceps. He treks through the brushy trails toward the lake. He can't run, he needs to keep it casual. Plus he doesn't want to look sweaty.

What if Becky wants to go swimming? Should he have worn shorts? What if she's wearing a bikini?

Derek nearly trips over a tree root.

When he reaches the lake, she's already waiting there for him. Becky's got her headphones on, bobbing her head to what Derek's werewolf ears pick out as the Goo Goo Dolls. Her purple polished nails are carding through her hair, taking out a braid and working on a new one.

"I like your hair," Derek compliments nervously, sitting down next to her. Is he sitting too close? Or too far? He wipes his palms on the knees of his jeans.

"Huh?" She lifts her headphones off of one ear and the sound of a guitar grows clearer.

"I, uh, I said I like your hair. You never braid it for school. That's cool."

Becky rolls her eyes at him, liner making them look big and brown. But she smiles, and Derek feels a little bit less nervous.

"Thanks, I guess."

She kisses him after that. It's aggressive and catches Derek off guard. He doesn't know where to put his hands when her nose bumps against his. Derek's mouth is dry and her lips are sticky. The scent of artificial strawberries overpowers him.

They part for long enough for them to catch their breath. Derek feels himself gasping and embarrassed by it when their lips clash together again. She moves one of his hands to her waist and he takes hold of her wrist with his other hand. When she starts licking at his lower lip he's terrified that his fangs are going to drop.

Derek swears there's a gross strand of saliva between them when she breaks away again.

"Hey, what's the problem? I thought you were into me." Her voice is husky, somewhere between concerned and pissed-off.

"I- I am! Totally." His voice cracks and he feels mortified. She smiles wide and as predatory as a teenage girl can.

"Good." She scoots close until their thighs are pressed together.

She smells good, like shampoo and cloyingly sweet lipgloss. His lips tingle and he's not sure if it's from the kissing or from her Doublemint gum, but he's totally fine with any and all tingling sensations.

"Man. I'm glad I broke up with Eric, now," she says against Derek's lips. Praise and guilt flutter in his stomach, fighting like violent butterflies. Eric hadn't looked very happy last Derek had seen him in World History. The swipe of Becky's tongue against the roof of his mouth makes him forget.

They make out and Derek loses track of time. Becky's CD player's gone quiet and only the wet sound of kissing breaks the silence of the lake. Junior year is shaping up to be awesome.

"We should go swimming," Becky suggests brightly, already standing up and shucking off her top. She totally was wearing a bikini.

"Uh," Derek says dumbly.

"C'mon," she says, toeing off her shoes. She tosses her hair over her shoulder in a dark wave

"I- I didn't bring a suit or anything... I could go grab one? My house is close."

She laughs. "Don't be silly. Swim in your boxers, I don't care."

He doesn't think that's a good idea. It sounds like someone's perfected the formula for teenage embarrassment. When she skims out of her shorts revealing bright blue bottoms covered in stars, he's sure of that.

"Aw, come on," she says again and pulls him to his feet. He clears his throat awkwardly, surprised by her strength. "Don't be such a dork." She steps into the water and it laps at her ankles in sluggish ripples.

He opens his mouth around another protest but it dies in his throat when she yanks on his arm again, purple nails digging into his skin. "It's just water," she snaps as he stumbles toward her.

Derek loses his balance. He thinks he maybe hasn't had it all afternoon.

The surface of the lake looks as imposing as solid glass as it rushes toward his face but it parts around him easy and gentle and warm. Derek doesn't even think it makes a sound when he breaks the surface.

Murky water blurs his vision. It's too dark. When he tries scooping through it his arms are slow and his fingers can't find the surface. How can he be in this deep? They were just at the bank. Confusion and panic well in him and he fights harder, limbs burning with the strain. 

Werewolf healing can fix a lot, but it won't save him from the water invading his lungs.

He coughs and swallows more water, trying to wheel around to find the surface. Shoe-clad feet make him clumsy as he kicks out toward what he hopes is the bottom. There's no light and no up or down. His chest burns. He thinks he's wolfed out, but he can't tell any more.

The world goes soft around him.

A hand grips the back of his shirt and water flows across his skin as he's hauled upward. And just like that he's coughing up what feels like a gallon of water along with everything else in his stomach. Gasping never felt so amazing. His back spasms as he heaves. There's a rock digging into his forearm but he can't be bothered to move at all. He can feel a rivulet of water running down his nose.

When he finally blinks the water from his eyes, he's alone.

His mother tears him a new one when he comes home sopping, wet to the bone. He's grounded pretty much until prom.

Not that it matters. Becky doesn't so much as look at him the next day.

 

***

 

Derek gets back to the motel well after nightfall.

He parks the Camaro on the other side of the building. He loves that car, but it's loud enough for any human to hear him coming, his alpha aside.

He feels ridiculous creeping around the building, listening for any sign of Laura. If they'd been staying in a nicer establishment, people surely would have called the police to report a shady figure in a leather jacket skulking about the parking lot. It's been a ridiculous day, though, so Derek doesn't really feel bad about it.

Climbing the stairs to the second level, he fishes his room key from his pocket. He'd lucked out and was the only one not sharing with someone. Isaac'd said it was because he threatened them with his eyebrows. He won't confirm or deny that. Officially, he's just better than the other two boys at rock, paper, scissors.

Boyd's leaning up against the railing looking both casual and intimidating in a way that not even Derek can quite replicate. Eyes fixed on a dark point off in the distance, Boyd looks focused. But Derek gets that that's just how his face looks. They share misleading resting faces.

Turning the room key over in his fingers, Derek nods at Boyd and Boyd returns it.

"Laura?"

"Said she was going to bed an hour ago."

"I don't have much time, then."

Boyd grunts agreeably and gives Derek the foundations of a smile.

"Isaac snoring again?" 

"No. Says he can't wait to watch the new episode of _Downton_. He knows I'm not caught up."

Derek shakes his head sympathetically.

"And this is the same person who begged for mercy when Laura threatened a dramatic reading of _A Feast for Crows_?" That's what the little shit got for not reading anything more complicated than the occasional magazine article. Derek always thought he'd needed to be older to be this concerned with America's youth.

Boyd just shrugs, huge shoulders rolling amicably. Breath condenses in front of the both of them in wispy tendrils for several moments before Derek turns the key over in his hand again.

"You didn't see me," he says, keying into the dingy painted metal door.

Not turning to look at him, Boyd waves a hand.

While he's brushing his teeth, he hears Laura interrogating Boyd about him. She knows she heard Derek coming back, she even bangs on his door a little, but she never orders either of them to spill or open the door. Derek loves his sister more than anybody, but he's never been the best at dealing with that emotion.

It takes a long time for him to get warm once he crawls into bed. He still feels like his face is half frozen. And before he shuts his eyes he tries to imagine what it must feel like, being trapped alone in a frigid body of water with nothing but scales for warmth.

 

***

 

It's still dark outside the next morning when Derek bundles up to leave. He has to crank the heat in his car to full blast just so it doesn't feel like the leather seats have a personal vendetta against his junk. He thinks his balls might never want to leave the warmth of his abdomen once he sits down.

Once he's halfway to the grocery store, he feels more comfortable, though, and by the time he's parked next to a rusty tan pickup, he's downright toasty.

The store's in the middle of switching over from the night crew to the morning crew, employees milling about with a couple jaw-cracking yawns. He hears one making conversation with an older customer with a deep voice about the weather, neither looking forward to their return trips to their vehicles. This time of day, the store's quiet. Mostly it's older guys with manual labor type jobs grabbing their coffee and something for lunch before heading in to their early shifts. The atmosphere is a subdued sort of no-nonsense lull that Derek thrives on.

Wheels on the cart rattling as he makes his way down the aisle, Derek grabs what he needs quickly. He spends more time than he should in the junk food aisle and tries to make up for it throwing a plastic box of kale chips into the cart. He doesn't bother with the frozen foods aisle and ends his run by hefting a bag of rock salt into the cart, glad there's nobody around to notice how fake he looks when he has to pretend he doesn't have werewolf strength.

"Didja find everything ok?" Too perky to be from the night crew, the cashier rings out his order quickly. She's too busy trying to subtly check Derek out to notice the utterly obscene amount of toaster pastries in his cart. Derek can't say he minds. He even makes a bit of a fuss lifting the bag of salt out from the bottom of the cart. When he smiles at her, he's afraid she might swoon before she can take his money.

By seven, he's grabbed a coffee from the kiosk at the entrance and has all of the grocery bags loaded into the backseat.

His car's bouncing up the dirt drive of the Hale house at twenty past and he's actively trying to scald his tongue so he doesn't think about what he's doing. How stupid this must look.

Under the fangs and bushy eyebrows and muscles, he's a giant softie. That's what Laura says, anyway. Derek doesn't think that's true, but he isn't _heartless_. He can't let the kid starve to death. Not when his brown eyes had been so wide, asking for help so earnestly, hand warm on Derek's arm.

Derek kills the ignition and crawls after the food in the back seat. He hesitates for a long while before entering the house through the side door. It's too much to carry with him, so he has to leave some of it in the old kitchen.

Mom had picked out the grey and white flecked tile and it almost looked new, untouched by fire damage. The countertops are dusty and there's an impressive spiderweb in the corner by the fridge.

After making sure the cabinets have no unwanted residents, Derek stows half of the goods and returns to the car for the rest, his steps down the stairs hurried.

It's probably the most cumbersome stroll through the woods he's ever taken. Nimbly picking around trees and gnarled shrubbery with only the hazy grey of dawn lighting his way, he's shouldered the bag of rock salt and has three plastic grocery bags draped over his other arm, whacking into his hip with a crinkling noise as he walks. He takes his time, in no particular hurry to reach his destination.

The clearing is as still as it always is, dark despite open access to the lightening sky. It takes a few moments for Derek's keen eyes to adjust after he sets his payload down near his boulder from yesterday. The water looks undisturbed, ink black and absorbing light. He wonders if mermaids sleep under water. They must, right? How long can they hold their breaths for? Or did they have gills?

Derek's giving the water's edge plenty of leeway as he ponders Stiles's whereabouts when a shadowy shape at the river's mouth catches his eye. Hunched and small, Derek can just barely pick out the line of bony shoulders. He sniffs and smells saltwater present amongst the green forest smells. Approaching slowly, Derek calls out the merman's name.

If he was closer, Derek might be more willing to reach across to shake him awake. But, separated by ice, Derek reconsiders waking a sleeping supernatural being so close to such cold water.

Stiles lays half out of the water, arms crossed up on the ice, cushioning his cheek. His short hair sticks up at odd angles. It seems lighter than the day before, but that's probably because it's dry now. Long lashes curl across his cheekbones, mouth partially open and slackened by sleep. It's a pretty picture, and Derek wonders if all merpeople are beautiful. He can't imagine what the one Stiles is marrying must look like.

The only thing marring the picture is a mucusy slime covering Stiles's pale skin. Strands shimmer wetly along the ice here and there and Derek's glad he elected not to prod Stiles into waking. He clears his throat again, briefly wondering if the merman died during the cold night. But his mole-speckled back is rising and falling with the deep breaths of sleep, so...

"Stiles!" He finally shouts, sharper than he'd normally like.

It does the trick. Stiles careens into the land of the living with an eloquent "bwuh?" and promptly loses his grip on the ice, plunging downward into the lake with several graceless arm movements. He comes up sputtering, hair dark once more.

A few moments pass before Stiles appears to register that he's staring at Derek. Preoccupied with the way the merman's tiny claws grip at the ice, it takes Derek a few moments to realize he's staring back.

Compelled to explain himself with the most obvious of statements, Derek says, "I brought breakfast."

Stiles's eyes brighten with indignant rage. He chokes on his words at first before they all seem to burst from his mouth all at once. "You think you can just waltz back here on your stupid feet? Who gave you the right? Do I look like I can be bought? Breakfast." By the time it's all out his mouth is pressed into a conflicted pink line.

A little guilty and defensive for it, Derek glares at the merman once the rush of words sweeps past, leaving the clearing awkwardly quiet. His heavy eyebrows knit together and he wonders if he maybe shares the same look of conflict.

"You have a little... slime, uh, on your ear." He gestures toward the offending goop shining behind an ear near a dark mole.

It's a start, because Stiles's look of anger shifts to brief embarrassment. He swipes at his ear and dunks his head under for good measure, grimacing. "Because you look so presentable when you wake up," he mutters to himself. Once he's done, he levels a firm look at Derek and the werewolf finds himself paying heed. "Be careful passing the jam to me or you might get your toesies wet," he adds flippantly.

The words are so at odds with such a serious face, and Derek knows that by all rights, he should leave the ingrate where he swims. Under any other circumstances, he'd already be venting his anger. But it's a truce, as odd as the merman in front of him. And Derek is willing to accept it for what it is. Especially, he figures, since it would appear that the mermaid is equally willing to trust Derek. If Stiles was smarter, he might reconsider that judgement, Derek thinks.

So instead of snapping back he fishes through the grocery bags and draws out a silvery package of toaster pastries and chucks them at Stiles's head.

Stiles looks ready to break their tentative truce when the foil packet hits him square on his upturned nose. All is forgotten, however, when he takes a bite of cold dough and sugary filling. Stiles moans appreciatively and Derek busies himself with needlessly rearranging the grocery bags, feeling himself flush with embarrassment on Stiles's behalf.

"How are all you surface-dwellers not incredibly fat?"

Huffing down at the bags, Derek rolls his eyes. "Some people do their best."

"Well I can't blame them if _this_ is what you get to eat. I could eat this for the rest of my life! Especially instead of seaweed. Or shrimp. Ugh, gross."

"I think I've created a monster," Derek mutters to himself. He can't help but stare back at the merman, who already has the second pastry in his mouth, mouth stretched wide in an apparent attempt to inhale the pastry. He still forks over another packet when Stiles holds his hand out demandingly, more gently than the first time. Stiles pauses to savor these, considering the texture of the frosting and the dryness of the corners with relish.

The groceries are all categorized in their bags by the time he finishes, Derek flushed with the effort.

"Just for that," Stiles says, licking crumbs from his long fingers, "I'm gonna let you in on a little secret." He grins conspiratorially at Derek for a moment but continues on with a dissatisfied sigh when Derek doesn't react. "Yesterday I told you I don't grant wishes. It's not really a mermaid thing. But I just so happen to know someone who might be able to grant you a wish. A little one, nothing too serious. Hate to dash your hopes if you're aiming for wold domination or something. But maybe some extra fortune, a little extra help with the ladies, maybe. I wouldn't think you'd need it, but your personality leaves a lot to be desired, pal."

Derek growls lowly but it doesn't appear to affect the merman, who continues on. "Anyway, I expect that she'll be happy to see me once I get out of here. I hope she'll be happy. But if you help me out of this mess, I think we could arrange something." Stiles gives him a confident nod,  shoulders a little tense.

That's a lot to consider. Derek figures that most people would love the shot at getting a wish granted by a mythical creature. He's always been a bit of a skeptic, though. What's worse is he can't really think of anything he'd even bother asking for; the problems in his life are mountains in the face of easy steps.

Stiles is waiting so patiently for a response, though, and Derek finds it just as easy to grunt an agreement as it is to debate the applications of wishes to real world problems. If he's honest with himself, it's a little easier to commit himself to this if it looks like he's in it for a payoff. Stiles beams smugly when he agrees, and Derek is fine with that.

"So, what else do you have in there? I'm starving."

Derek decides it's probably unwise and vastly irresponsible to feed Stiles nothing but junk, and supplies him with a banana instead. Doubtful that sugar is a common component to a mermaid diet. He has to demonstrate how to peel it after Stiles manages a big bite of peel-clad fruit with a grimace. Everything feels a little surreal.

"That was amazing," Stiles says after a small belch. Derek doesn't think that any number of stern facial expressions will teach the boy manners.

"Fruit's not really on the menu under the sea, I gather," Derek muses aloud.

Stiles shakes his head. "Not normally. Sometimes you'll get lucky. Mostly it's just coconuts and cranberries, when we do swim inland. Once I found an orange that someone dropped off of a cruise ship. Probably the best thing I ever ate. Until now, I guess. You're going to give me bad habits. I'll wind up like one of those beggar dolphins, hustling two-leggers for treats." He chuckles at his own joke.

Derek's not really surprised with the kid's response to people food, then. He even feels a little sorry for him and he's absently planning another trip to the store.

"So. We gonna dig me out today?" Right.

When he grunts again in reply, Stiles tells him he sounds like a walrus. He tells Stiles he sounds like someone right before they get strangled. And then they get to work.

The chink of metal against ice becomes a constant sound in the clearing, along with the rattling scrape of the shovel scooping. Derek takes up working on the river again while Stiles swims underneath to pry at the frozen rocks damming up the riverbed. It's slow work that Derek finds him losing himself in, the noise and the dull ache in his muscles after an hour. He doesn't even have to think.

After a while, though, Stiles returns to the surface panting. Derek doesn't think he's seen him come up at all in the past however long they've been at it.

"How often do you have to come up for air?" He's figured by now that Stiles probably doesn't have gills, the way he surfaces with loud breaths from time to time, and so he must be more similar to a whale than to a fish. Not that it did much good trying to classify mythical creatures like mermaids and werewolves.

Up on the ice shelf again and breathing tiredly, Stiles's eyes brighten. Pulling himself up on shaky arms, he sits, tucking his silvery tail underneath him, fins still dragging through the water. Once he's comfortable, he looks expectantly at Derek.

"I have a proposal."

"No."

"Wh- Hey! I've not even told you what it is yet."

"I can already tell I won't like it." The way Stiles has settled himself in bodes of conversations Derek isn't likely to have. "Just get back to work."

Stiles ignores him. "Fine, fine. Dig away in silence. Be a grumpy gills." Derek really doesn't think that the merman _gets_ him. "By the time you're done, you'll know that merfolk swim to get around and a whole lot of _nothing else_." Spitting out the words like it's the worst thing he's ever said.

"It's not like I can even share any of this. So what's it matter?"

Shrugging, he doesn't offer up any reasons. Instead he flicks his tail in his water, looking disinterested.

"What is it?" He asks before he can stop himself.

A wide grin splits the merman's face. "Nothing complicated. We just trade answers. You want to know more about me, and I want to more about the surface."

It seems too easy, but Derek nods anyway.

"Great! You go first. Ask me whatever you want."

"Do you ever shut up?"

"Nope. How do you get your eyebrows to do that?"

With an annoyed noise, Derek tries to tell his eyebrows not to do the thing. He feels himself failing.

"Want to start over?" And it's all Derek can do to not shove Stiles back into the water.

"Fine." He pauses, trying to sort through his thoughts. He's not interested in letting this game go very far, so he needs to pick carefully. "When I woke you up earlier you were covered in something slimy. What was that?"

Stiles swipes at his arms absently like he's checking himself over again. "Exactly what it looked like. It's slime. We're not meant to be out of the water for very long. Guess I slept like that for a while. It keeps us from drying out, basically." He waves his hand demonstratively as he speaks. fingers gesturing out at the water and then back at himself.

Humming thoughtfully, Derek's foot presses into the shovel blade. He realizes it's been several minutes since he last used it and he presses down, tossing a few more icy chunks toward the bank. He's scored the ice's surface precariously thin in places, and he moves to avoid being in a dangerous position.

"My turn," Stiles says. "So, what are you?"

Derek stills, boot poised once again over the shovel. He's glad to be looking down. It would be too telling to look away.

He's silent for too long, and Stiles speaks again. "I know you're not a human, so don't try it. I've seen plenty of humans before. But I've never met a human whose eyes glow. Plus, I saw your claws." Stiles flexes his own. "So, spill. We had an agreement."

This is coercion. Stiles tricked him and he fell for it. An angry noise rises from his throat. Finally, he looks back at the merman settled up on the ice. Stiles is watching him with wide brown eyes. His tail is curled up under him in an almost feminine manner, pose merely circumstantial to his anatomy. Scales across the boy's forearms and belly gleam an iridescent silver in the grey midmorning light.

"I'm a werewolf," Derek says, because it doesn't honestly matter what a werewolf tells a merman.

And just like that, Stiles bobs his head thoughtfully. "I see you're gonna make me work for this," he says, before telling Derek that it's his turn again.

It's too easy, Derek thinks. But the large portion of his brain ruled by logic argues that it makes perfect sense.

"How long can you hold your breath for?"

"About an hour. Sometimes a little longer if I have to. I know one guy that can stay down for two, though. We even come up while we're sleeping. Can you turn into a wolf?"

"No. Just fangs and claws. My mother can, though. Why do you migrate?"

"For food, mainly. It helps to keep us from being noticed, too. Keeps us in contact with other mermaid families. We don't stay in fresh water for very long. It's easier to be noticed by people, though the fish are easier to catch. But our scales like the salt water better. See? They look so dull. Anyway, did you make that food, the sweet ones? Are you a baker?"

"No. They're PopTarts. I got them from the grocery store. You sound like you already know a lot about humans, for someone stuck in the water."

"Not really a question. But we know lots about people. People are loud, and they do loud things. Merfolk would go extinct if we didn't learn about humans. In oil spills, to boat propellers, to pollution, in fisherman's nets. We got really good at knowing as much as possible from down here. Plus, I've perfected the art of drying books out. Do you read?"

"Yes."

"Okay, seriously?  Stop it with the half answers. I'm giving you a lot, here."

Like the world's most stubborn door, Derek begins to open up after that. Stiles's answers a tide of information, and Derek's a slow trickle, growing each time. Derek supposes he owes it, receiving such detail for his queries. He shares the abilities werewolves have, what Walmart is, how daylight saving time works, why men only wore skirts in Scotland, and whether he also enjoyed toaster pastries or just raw meat, being so closely tied to wolves. In return he learns a wealth about Stiles's kind - social structure, habitat range, linguistic ability. He barely feels he's scratched the surface when he hears the ice groaning under his feet.

He leaps backward onto the bank when a deep crack materializes in the ice, snaking down the river a few feet. Stiles whoops at the progress, despite having spent the time doing no work at all.

Derek's hands are bloody again, rubbed raw by the shovel's handle. Werewolf healing didn't even allow them to callus. He catches Stiles staring as they heal, leaving only blood and unmarred skin underneath.

"Remind me to never get on your bad side." He sounds suitably impressed.

Derek cleans his hands with some snow and rolls his eyes, though Stiles can't see it. "Too late for that," he says. He doesn't find much conviction in the words. "Do mermaids not have healing abilities?"

Stiles shrugs. "Not like that. I don't know how long it takes for humans to heal, though."

After a while, Derek sheds his leather jacket like he should have an hour ago; labor warming him unbearably despite the chill and the hazy clouds covering the sun. His stomach growls as he hangs his coat over a snarly pine branch.

"Time for lunch."

Stiles looks like he might protest. The new crack in the ice has him hopefully picking at the lake with his trowel again. The sound of plastic bags rusting against one another finds him dropping the tool and looking over, pavlovian.

Derek prepares two peanut butter sandwiches. It's harder than it should be, awkwardly juggling the bread and the jar of peanut butter. He'd had the foresight to buy some disposable knives, but not plates, and he has to lick his fingers clean once he hands one of the sandwiches to Stiles. The merman looks at the food doubtfully. He'd made a face as soon as Derek began scooping out the peanut butter. Trusting still, he takes a hesitant bite.

"Sweet Poseidon, this is amazing. I had my doubts. That stuff looks disgusting, man." Tail dragging through the water as contentedly as a cat's, Stiles makes more disturbing sounds of appreciation. The sandwich is gone within minutes and Derek has to put his down to make more for the merman. Might as well. He knows he'll be eating more than one, too.

"They're good with banana on them too," Derek finds himself sharing. "But I don't think you can handle that."

"Baby steps." Stiles doesn't even sound insulted. "I want to eat these at my wedding," he moans happily around a mouthful and Derek's stomach rolls.

"You can't eat peanut butter sandwiches at a wedding."

Not one to be deterred, Stiles splashes water in his general direction. "It's my wedding. And they're good. And you aren't the boss of me."

"That wouldn't even work under water," Derek says, giving in to childishness.

After they're done, Stiles falls backward into the water, skin already looking a little off from so much time exposed to the air. Derek supposes that the rule about waiting to swim after you eat must not apply to aquatic humanoids.

Stiles stays under, and Derek picks the shovel back up. He moves further down the river to work, glad for the quiet, but finding the lack of Stiles's loud voice unusual after so long.

The river flowing from the lake is deep enough to carry enough water to feed the large body of water, but it's comparatively narrow. Where they'd made the most progress, it spanned only about six feet across. It wound that way for a few hundred yards before opening up to a width four times that. From there it twisted and turned its way toward the major waterways which finally led to the Pacific beyond. The lake as a whole one very small point in a very large network, so difficult to end up at, but Stiles had succeeded where even freshwater fish had failed.

Derek enjoys the work. Though the progress is slow, it's something he can see taking shape. The burn in his arms and back is more than he even feels out romping under a full moon with the pack and he likes it. Now and again a pressurized huff of air and water heralds Stiles's return to the surface before he dives back down again, given new vigor by food and thoughts of home.

Using snow to clean his hands again, Derek notices the sun hanging low in the sky. _Shit_ , he thinks, before going to fish his cell from his jacket pocket. When he turns it on, the display cheerily reflects the time, 4:14. The clock rolls over to 4:15 before the phone blares several alerts all at once: three voicemails and five texts from Laura, two from Isaac and fourteen from Erica. He's screwed.

Scrambling to pull on his coat and put the shovel away, Derek almost trips over the grocery bags in his haste. He'd gone the whole day without remembering about the salt, too. Stiles is leaning up against the ice again, presumably to investigate the cacophony created by Derek's cell.

"What's the matter?" Mild concern blankets his expression.

"It's my - _fuck_ \- my sister." He slows when he really does stumble over a rock, Stiles raises his brows. "I was supposed to meet her for this thing this afternoon, and I'm late. Probably already missed it. She's going to kill me."

"I'm sure she'll understand. I mean, I don't have a sister or anything, but that's what they're supposed to do, right? People make mistakes all the time." Stiles seems overly calm about this, and Derek gnashes his teeth.

"She's been after me all week about this. You don't get it. And I can't even tell her why I wasn't there." He regrets the gruffness in his tone when Stiles's mouth twitches upward in gratitude.

"Tell her you had a rendezvous with a secret lover." There's a mocking waggle of his eyebrows. "She'll have to forgive you, then."

An embarrassed choking noise escapes Derek, sounding like a wounded seagull. But he feels the tension leaving him, fists he hadn't known he'd clenched unclenching, and he shrugs.

"You're an idiot, and I don't know why I'm helping you." He pulls the grocery bags closer to the bank, easily within Stiles's reach. "Here's the food. Nothing in here will spoil by being out here, but they might freeze a little. Don't eat it all or you might never make it back up the river."

"Hah hah," Stiles remarks sarcastically, still greedily eyeing the bags.

Derek stands to leave, reminding himself to try the salt tomorrow when he returns. He double checks his pockets for his car keys and slips his phone back, not wanting to even look at any of the messages yet.

"Hey, Derek?" Stiles asks, and Derek turns to face him. His arms are sprawled across the ice shelf, the wiry muscles of his shoulders straining at the awkward angle and his spine bowed.

"Yeah?" he answers.

"You wound up asking the last question, so I was wondering..." He pauses, as if expecting Derek to interrupt him. "I was wondering why you're here?" And that's a question _way_ too loaded for Derek to even want to consider bothering with, but Stiles continues. "Ah! Not like, why you're _here_ , here. You're helping me, fisherman, and gift seahorses and all that. But why you were at the lake yesterday. You're pretty much the only thing with a pulse to come by since I got here. And clearly you're not the world's greatest swimmer." He moves his hands as he speaks and licks his lips once he's done.

It's a funny question to ask. Observant and innocuous. But it's also worded so lightly that Derek thinks he can answer it both safely and satisfactorily.

"I used to live here. This lake is part of a nature preserve that my family ran. My sister and I are back in town for a while, and I needed somewhere to think."

"And throw rocks."

"Right." And Stiles nods, content with the answer.

"Well I can't say I liked the rocks, but I can't be picky, I guess. I'll see you tomorrow morning. Same time, same place."

Rolling his eyes, Derek huffs, exasperated. "Unless you were planning on relocating. Sure," he agrees to Stiles's bold schedule anyway and makes his way back to his car, Stiles waving animatedly at his back.

 

***

 

"Where the _hell_ have you been?"

Derek pulls up to the coffee shop at 4:45, setting sun turning the metallic orange lettering on the window a fiery orange. He barely manages to slip out of the Camaro before Laura's on him, hissing and spitting like a wet cat. With anybody else, Derek would be holding up a hand, making them give him some space, but he's pretty attached to his hands in this case.

"Our meeting was at three thirty!" Laura doesn't wait for him before continuing. "We waited for you! Do you realize how unprofessional I looked?" She looks anything but in a blazer and designer heels, but Derek feels just as guilty anyway.

"You're lucky they agreed to push the date back," she tells him. Her voice wavers, counting her own lucky stars. Laura's the only one opposed to this deal, and she knows it. Maybe she thinks she can use the extra time to appeal to Derek. Derek thinks he might be willing to let her try.

"I'm sorry," he says. He's at a loss for more appropriate words - hopes these sound sincere enough. His sister sighs, dropping her hands into a less aggressive stance, and she pats him on a massive shoulder, her hand looking tiny in comparison.

"Yeah, yeah. I know you'd rather eat wolfsbane salad than sit through a meeting with a bunch of lawyers. At least Peter wasn't at this one."

Making a noise of agreement, he nods, stilling under his alpha's touch. Neither of them had seen Peter in the six years since the fire. He'd been badly injured and needed constant medical attention. Even with werewolf healing, it didn't look like he'd ever manage to fully recover. So Laura, barely an adult herself, and newly alpha after the death of the rest of their family, had taken Derek across the country and away from the mess behind them.

Peter had made great strides in recovery, though. It had surprised them to hear that he'd finally emerged from the coma he'd been in for several months, and then again that he'd begun to speak, to eat normally, to walk. Some of the scarring had even begun to heal. Derek couldn't imagine what the doctors must think - how disappointed he imagined they must have been when they were declined permission to publish Peter's case.

They were glad he was alive. He was the only family they still had. That being said, though, they still liked him about as much as they had as children. Their mother's peculiar brother who came to visit for extended periods of time.

"So where were you Derek? It better have been damned important."

Derek looks toward the gleaming coffee shop window again, trying to think of a believable excuse.

"I was at the house. I just lost track of time." The half-truth is enough to convince his sister. His heartbeat is steady when he sees her listening for it.

"What were you doing there? You smell like a lumberjack, and not in a paper towel commercial kind of way." She cackles a little when he glares at her and doesn't appear to expect an answer from him. Instead, she looks pleased, dark eyes warm and hopeful.

He shrugs and she withdraws her hand, placing them on her hips instead. "Well, ok. Just make it next week." And that's all she says about that. For now, anyway.

She runs her fingers through her hair, disheveling the silky black strands. "I'm hungry. Would you believe they had the nerve to sell all of their scones before I had the chance to get one?" She raises her hands in a haughty look, pretending at self-importance. "Come on, brother mine. You're taking me to dinner." She circles around to the passenger side door to his car, letting herself in with an air of finality. Derek's glad that she's not insisting she drive it again.

He's more relaxed than he has any right to be, considering the day he's had. It's been hectic and _too much_ , but he thinks it might have been just a little more interesting than the few preceding days. And now he's here with his alpha, and she isn't too upset with him after all. He snaps open the door and sinks into the seat again, starting the engine.

"I thought I smelled like a gross lumberjack. And what about the others?"

Laura waves a hand casually. "They're big kids. They can fend for themselves. And we can ask the restaurant if they have some Febreze."

Dinner will be like practicing dentistry on a lion, he knows. But as Derek pulls out of the parking lot, he's just glad that Stiles was right.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks again to everyone for your comments, kudos, and continued support! They're especially appreciated, as this fic is much, much longer than any other I've ever written.
> 
> [Thesenlex](http://thesenlex.tumblr.com/) was generous enough to offer their time to beta read for me! A billion thanks to them for slogging through my awkward words. Any remaining mistakes are all my own! You can also find me on [tumblr](http://orange-crow.tumblr.com/). This story is rated Explicit for future chapters, but will be tagged with applicable tags as it goes to avoid disappointing anyone. Please enjoy!

Laura insists on Thai food, so Derek does what any good brother would do and takes them to the finest Thai restaurant Beacon Hills has to offer. Granted, it's the only Thai restaurant Beacon Hills has to offer.

Pungent spices make Derek's eyes water as soon as they walk through the door, and the place smells a little like fish underneath everything else. It doesn't smell _bad_ , per se, but it's definitely distinctive, especially to sensitive werewolf noses.

"Don't think they have any Febreze," he remarks to Laura once the seater begins leading them to a booth. She smacks him hard in the arm with enough force to bruise, if only for a few moments.

"Shut up, you punk."

The look on her face as they sit hints that she caught his brief smile.

Despite the establishment's powerful odor, the decor is quite tasteful. Elaborate ink paintings cover the walls; the lacquered tables are clean; booths and chairs are all arranged neatly throughout the dining room, spaced just far enough apart for intimate conversation. For an early Wednesday evening, it's already half full of patrons.

After ordering two waters, they settle into a comfortable silence as they peruse the menu. It reminds Derek of their first Thanksgiving after the fire. Chinese food in New York, both adventurous and convenient for the pair of them, at the time.

When their server returns, two water glasses perched on her tray, Laura orders the spiciest thing she can find on the menu, a curry dish with three foreboding flame icons in the description. Grimacing, Derek requests a milder dish with chicken and noodles and broccoli along with some sour soup. He's almost positive that he can eat more than that, but he figures he'll cross that bridge when he comes to it.

"I thought you usually get the green curry? With the fish? What's it called..." Laura's eyebrows are drawn together thoughtfully.

He shrugs. "Figured I might switch it up."

Once the waitress leaves with their orders, Derek does his best to make small talk, and for all the time he'd spent dreading having to face his sister over the past few days, he has to admit that his sister is the only person he feels completely comfortable speaking to in the stilted manner so defining of himself. Laura knew him well enough to fill in the gaps he left.

"What's everyone else been doing while we're here?"

Laura gestures vaguely with one hand. "Keeping busy. Everything's gotten so much bigger since we left. Erica and I went shopping yesterday. I think she might have dragged Boyd out to the outlet over in the next town, today. Don't know if they brought Isaac with them." She pauses to sip her water. "God, I hope they brought Isaac with them."

Isaac was prone to getting into trouble on his own. The kid acquired fake IDs faster than his alpha could take them from him.

"But there's a new movie theater," she continues, "and they re-opened the old railroad museum."

He nods, and for several moments silence stretches out between them, prominent over the din of cutlery and low conversation.

"When's their winter break over?" The question feels abrupt when it passes over his tongue, and the look he gets from Laura suggests the same.

"Monday after next. But their teachers agreed to give them an extension for a few extra days if we need it." Derek supposes it must be difficult to deny the legal guardian of several inner-city orphans much of anything. Laura considers him for a while before continuing, eyes keen and bright, even in human form. "They've only got a year and a half left. They could finish this year up in New York and do their senior year here. And Boyd might even place out. He's been doing so many classes at the college..."

"Have you asked any of them about this?" It was a big deal, asking three kids to move away from where they'd grown up. Especially while asking them to start at a new school at the same time.

Face set in seriousness, she nods, a dark lock of hair slipping off her shoulder. She tucks it back behind her ear. "Briefly. It's not a sure thing yet, of course." She gives him an appraising look. "But they're on board."

Derek's still trying to figure out how to respond when their food arrives. Laura looks almost as relieved as he feels at the interruption, and they busy themselves with eating.

From the first bite, Derek is ravenous, and he barely takes the time to breathe as he wolfs down his meal. His food is tucked away before Laura is even half done huffing and puffing past the spiciness of her own dish.

"I'm shocked you're not wearing half of that," Laura comments blithely between bites. Derek's a little surprised, himself, and he absently wishes he'd taken a little more time to taste his food.

The cushy booth draws the exhaustion from Derek's bones and he slouches down deeper into his seat absorbed in quiet reflection while his sister finishes her meal. His mind wanders back to Stiles. He'd left the merman with plenty to eat, but the food in his own belly made him feel a little guilty that what he'd left for Stiles was mostly junk, though Derek doubted Stiles cared. It was the best that could be done, Derek reminds himself, but guilt always came to him more easily than the gratitude of others.

When the waitress comes by to collect the dishes, he finds himself ordering pineapple fried rice to go. "Without shrimp," he adds. Laura chokes in faint surprise and the little old Asian woman tuts at her mumbles about getting her more water.

Derek's not sure he's ready for the serious tone the conversation has to take next. Laura makes it a point to finish her food before the waitress can get back with more water. She stares at her brother for a moment, thoughtfully, and he still has to fight not to squirm like a pup under her scrutiny.

"Well," he starts, voice gruff, "say what you want to say." Conversation, for Derek, was like ripping off a band-aid. This one more than most.

Unsurprised by Derek's terseness, Laura clears her throat. "I think you already know most of what I have to say," she tells him, voice roughened by curry. "It's our childhood home, Derek. Of course we have to save it. It's our responsibility to protect it. Our family has lived here for over a hundred years."

_They did,_ Derek thinks.

"Look, I know you're still fucked up over the fire. Over everything. And I am, too. But this is how we make it right. We can come back and fix everything and I feel like the shittiest big sister for not bullying my stubborn, moody little brother into it sooner," she quirks a half-grin at him, flashing blunt white teeth. "But I still feel like a terrible older sister for making you choose now. I'm a pretty awful alpha, huh?"

Derek's stomach turns and he looks down. For a moment he considers telling Laura everything. About Kate and the hunters and the fire. He opens his mouth but the words stick to the roof of his mouth like a bad taste. After six years of silence, confessing to a relationship with an older woman who had turned out to be the werewolf hunter who had orchestrated the death of the rest of their family was a lot to ask for over Thai food.

Derek's glad they never had to see her during the trial. She'd admitted to lighting the blaze with the same mad spark that possessed her to create it in the first place. In retrospect, Derek doesn't know how he didn't see that touch of insanity in her. Perhaps it had been contagious. He'd been swept up in a whirlwind of sex, secrecy and teenage rebellion. But reasons gave him little comfort, now.

"No," he says, voice soft. "You're not a terrible alpha. You're a really great alpha. We all think so. But maybe Peter has a point. Maybe it's better to just move on with our lives. If we lease out the land, we'd have enough money to send the whole pack to college."

After reassembling their lives, he and Laura had attended school at the same time, putting a sizable dent in the money they'd gotten from the insurance settlement. They were still comfortable enough, and Laura had a great job coordinating three community centers in their area, but he knew he had a point.

She wrinkles her nose. "They'd rip all of the trees out for some stupid shopping mall, Derek. We can't. I won't let that happen. Not for anything." And it's her lightning-quick shift from morose to determined that has Derek nodding, agreeing. He's being selfish, and it makes him feel more guilty.

"I need some time," is all he says, but it sets Laura to beaming, smile more brilliant than the sun's been all week.

*** 

"I brought you food," Derek tells Stiles the next morning as soon as he spots the boy lifting his head from the water, dark hair flattened against his skull.

Stiles had been looking forward to the crunch of shoes on snow ever since he'd seen the sky lightening. He'd been getting lonely all by himself in the lake and found himself counting down the hours until he'd be in the company of another person again, even if that other person was a grouch.

"If I didn't know any better, I'd think you were courting me, what with all these delicious offerings," Stiles says, a wry quirk on his lips. He knew that teasing Derek wasn't the nicest thing for him to do, especially since the werewolf was his only source of conversation and his only hope to escape his icy prison, but it was just so _easy_. And Stiles kind of enjoyed the way he went all stiff and stoic in response. And, honestly, when had Stiles ever learned better?

True to form, Derek gives him a stony glare. "If you weren't neck-deep in water, I'd try to drown you," he growls, drawing back the hand that had been offering food.

With a hard flick of his tail, Stiles plants himself back on the now familiar outcropping of ice. "Hey, come on, fisherman. It was just a joke. Feed me. I promise not to draw any untoward conclusions." He even holds a hand up to lend sincerity to his oath. His stomach rumbles.

Derek stares at him for a good while, eyes pale and unreadable, for a good while before grunting and holding out the container again. Fragrant, unfamiliar scents tickle at Stiles's nose. Things just didn't smell this _amazing_ under the water. He's well and truly corrupted, Stiles thinks, ruined for all other meals for the rest of his life.

But, if he has to be stuck in this shitty little lake, he deserves to have one good thing, right?

"It's not really breakfast," Derek shrugs.

"Dude, in my world, breakfast, lunch, and dinner is fish, fish, and fish. With a side of fish. Do I look like I'm going to complain?" He reaches out for the offering and is surprised to find the paper carton warm. It makes his wet fingers tingle.

"You always look like you're going to complain."

And Stiles has a sarcastic retort ready at his lips, but decides it's not worth hurrying through his bite for.

Nearly overwhelmed by new flavors, he swears he'll never say anything bad about Derek ever, _ever_ again. There's a sweet tang of fruit, the savory bite of a protein that _definitely_ isn't fish, the crunch of some kind of seed or nut, and an overall flavor of unctuous goodness. What's more was that it was _hot._ Stiles had read about the numerous ways humans prepared their food, almost always involving a heat source, but the sensation was so unusual, warming him as he wolfed down the contents of the carton. Surface-dwellers had it so good, and Stiles knew they hardly even realized it.

Cheeks faintly pink, Derek stares at him again. Stiles thinks he must be making disgustingly appreciative noises again, but he can't help it.

"We just can't do food like this," Stiles says with a shrug. "If you suddenly sprouted a tail and discovered how woefully inept your species is at swimming, your mind would probably be pretty blown, too." It's a weak comparison, but it's the best Stiles can do under the influence of such deliciousness.

Derek snorts. "People swim just fine without tails," he says defensively.

Stiles laughs. "I spent last summer off the coast of Florida. You keep telling yourself that, buddy. Besides, you don't seem too keen on a quick dip."

"Because it's twenty degrees outside."

Stiles doubts it's any colder than the glare he gets from Derek.

Scales crawling, Stiles knows he's let his big mouth get away from him again. The werewolf has his back turned, massive shoulders hunched as he rifles around the plastic bags from yesterday. Talking had never been Stiles's strong point. He excelled at it, but it never failed to get him into trouble.

A heavy bag is dropped in front of him, and he flails backward as the ice groans threateningly. Derek smirks triumphantly before tearing the plastic open with a set of sharp claws. A chemical smell wafts from the bag and Stiles returns to the ice, curious to examine the contents.

"Rock salt. They use it to melt ice off the roads. Thought we should try it."

Stiles nods eagerly. The inventions humans came up with would probably never cease to amaze him. Getting an up-close glimpse like this was something he'd never imagined. In the past, books, rare, soggy treasures, had been his windows. Occasionally he'd even watch people on cruise ships and in their lake houses before his dad would drag him back below the surface where it was safer. Having the opportunity to observe this closely is more than he'd ever dreamed.

Derek hefts the bag up in his arms, and Stiles thinks it must be criminal, how easy he makes it look. He trails after the wolf in the water, watching as he begins to spread the faintly blue mixture on the surface of the ice Stiles had been working under. The resulting spread of salt across the ice looks almost disappointing. The bag had looked so big, yet its scattered contents barely managed a five-foot span.

"If it works, I'll get more. Then you'll be home in no time."

Stiles looks up from the ice blocking him in. He grins at his unlikely new companion.

"Sweet. If I'm missing for too much longer, my dad will probably think a shark got me." He snaps his teeth for effect.

With a familiar but halfhearted roll of his eyes, Derek moves away to grab his shovel. "Can't say I'd blame the shark."

"Hey!"

They don't speak much for a while after that, falling into an easy silence instead, Stiles diving down into the darkness of the lake to tug rocks from the frozen mouth of the lake with the noisy scrape of Derek working overhead. He pulls and digs until his claws sting and the muscles in his arms and tail are fatigued. He's not out of shape, by any means. But he's got the unique build of someone who spends more of his time running than actually fighting. It's his thing. He's not ashamed of it. He's smart enough to pick his battles. And it's worked out for him. Not the most popular merman under the sea, sure, but he's got the best friend anybody could ask for. His dad loves him, and the pod they travel in tolerates Stiles's eccentricities, for the most part. He gets to travel a lot, too, and they hardly ever return to the same destination two seasons in a row, unlike some pods. The variety is refreshing and there's always something to distract him. And he might not be the luckiest with the ladies, awkward and loud and lacking the charms of a perfect torso or Scott's adorable smile, but he's got a very solid long-term plan that's working in his favor instead. Wedding being proof of that. Besides, didn't all arranged marriages start out a little slowly? Lydia would warm up to him. Eventually. He hoped.

His dad had been lucky, Stiles thinks. His parents had already been in love by the time they'd been betrothed.

Slowly rising to the surface, the world takes a moment to sharpen as Stiles's senses adjust to the dry environment. Derek's diligently tossing chunks of ice over his shoulder. Fascinated, Stiles watches the muscles in his back tense and relax while he works. He'd taken his outer layer of clothing off again and rolled up part of the under layer to reveal his forearms. He really did remind Stiles of a fisherman. Without the smell.

"Is wearing clothes all the time weird?" He wonders aloud.

Derek doesn't turn to look at him, instead tossing another shovelful of ice back behind him.

"I don't know, is it weird not wearing clothes?" It sounds a little bratty, and coming from Derek's massive frame it makes Stiles laugh. Derek finally has the decency to look at him before turning back around. His brow's shiny with what Stiles realizes must be sweat.

Though Derek clearly hadn't expected an answer, Stiles enjoys talking enough to give him one anyway. "It's pretty great," he shares. "We wear jewelry, sometimes. And some of the girls wear tops, but that's more of a surface fad than anything else. But in the water, clothes get all clingy and gross. I tried a shirt once." He shakes his head and darkly says, "never again." To demonstrate the memory, Stiles shudders a little. He gets one of those eyebrows for his efforts.

"Modesty must not really be a mermaid thing."

Stiles shrugs. "It's not really an issue of modesty. It's just practical. Besides, if you hadn't noticed, we're a little different below the proverbial belt, anyway." He flashes Derek a quick peek at a scaly hip and grins widely when the werewolf freezes, shovel paused mid-air.

"I hadn't." Derek coughs. "Noticed."

"Yuh-huh." The flush on the man's face has Stiles crawling up onto the ice, delight tight and giddy in his chest. He can't help it.

By midday, the sun appears to have fought away the clouds for a time. It's no easier to move the rocks under the surface on his next trip down, but when Stiles rests on the ice again to watch Derek tirelessly digging, it creaks under his weight. _Should take it a little easier on the human food_. He scratches at his pale, flat belly, claws dragging lightly across the trail of scales there.

"You should give it a rest for a while," he calls out. "Looks like the sun's gonna take over for a bit." Derek grunts at him eloquently before setting the shovel aside, and Stiles closes his eyes, taking a moment to bask in the rays. It makes his scales feel dry and itchy, but he imagines the warmth on his skin must be the same sensation humans seek when he watches them lounging on the beach with sand between their toes.

"Imagining Mexico?" There's a brusqueness in Derek's voice that has Stiles slitting one curious eye open. Silently, he'd come to sit up on the bank behind Stiles. "That's where your wedding is, right?"

"Just enjoying the sunshine," he says, waving a noncommittal hand. "You should try it, grumpy gills. The present moment's where it's at."

Derek looks like he's cooking up quite a retort when Stiles lets his eye fall shut again. He's quiet, though, as Stiles leans backward to meet the bright winter sunlight, letting it gently lap across his neck and chest. He'll burn if he isn't careful, but it's been months since he's had a chance this nice.

The itching under his scales escalates from annoying to unbearable after a while, and he slips back down into the water for relief. But not before furiously scratching at a spot a little to the left of his dorsal fin. When he surfaces, he fully expects a death glare for the disruption his fidgeting wrought, but instead, Derek is staring intently at the ice where he'd just rested.

"What's the deal?" Stiles asks as he circles over for a closer look at whatever's so interesting. "Oh, ew." His claws reflexively at his tail again and winces when he feels a loose patch. A few of his tiny freshwater winter scales float atop a slick-looking bluish puddle that covers the ice. Four, five, six sharp-looking little flecks of silver-grey. "Guess I shouldn't sit on the salt."

Derek shakes his head, making a disgusted noise. "There's that idea, then."

"Hey, it's fine. I just won't sit on top of it. Or... you know, touch it. At all." Derek's doing that eyebrow thing at him again that makes him feel more ridiculous than usual. "Come on, it's salt. I spend two-thirds of my life in salt water."

Shaking his head, Derek refuses. "There's other crap in it, too. I should have figured it would hurt you." And Stiles thinks his voice sounds _way_ too mournful over an attempt to help him.

"Hey, there, fisherman. I'm fine! See?" To prove it, he contorts his body, lifting his tail from the water at an uncomfortable angle before dropping it back with a splash. And, sure, it looked a _little_ gross. But it really wasn't that bad. "I'm probably just molting early."

"M-" There's a strained look on Derek's face.

"Yeah, it's fine. Chill out. I have a different set of scales for the summer. They're really a lot nicer than these old things. It's a little early, I guess, but I _am_ headed down to warmer water, so it's fine," he repeats, testing out the most soothing voice he can manage. It might be working. "I'm sure werewolves get all weird and freaky, too."

And just like that, he's got Derek back to his normal stoic expression. The one where he looks like he's swallowed a sea slug. It makes Stiles smile.

They pick off of the groceries left from the day before, and Derek barely even comments about half of the peanut butter being gone. Stiles had grossly misjudged how much to used in a sandwich last night. While they eat, they pass in and out of conversation. Stiles is surprised at how much easier it feels, since yesterday Derek seemed more willing to lick barnacles than to shoot the breeze. Not that Stiles is complaining. It's actually pretty pleasant, once you get used to the monosyllabic answers.

"So the meeting with your sister went well?" The thought comes before he can even consider not speaking it aloud. He has a few seconds to shout some internal curse words at himself before Derek responds.

"Better than expected."

Brightly, he nods. "See? I told you! Like I said, I don't have a sister. But Scott and I are basically brothers, and my dad and I are real close, and I can do some pretty dumb shit." Like getting stuck in a lake in the middle of nowhere. "But they'll always forgive you. That's what they're for."

For his efforts, he receives a thoughtful grunt.

Still warm, the sun's sinking slowly in the sky. Since the bank near Derek is out of the question, he does a few lazy laps around the lake instead, mapping out the line of the shore until Derek's a tiny figure in the distance. When he returns, he thinks the werewolf may have fallen asleep. Eyes closed, he's leaning up against a large grey boulder. Sunlight scatters through the bare tree branches overhead, casting webs of shadow across his face. His scruffy jaw looks relaxed, at odds with the crease still present between his brows. 

"I met with her about the house. Here." The voice startles Stiles so badly that he yelps and ducks back under the cover of the water for a moment. Sheepish, he emerges and sees Derek looking at him, unreadable, before closing his eyes again. _Super hearing_ , Stiles reminds himself harshly. _He could probably hear my loud ass all the way across the water_.

"Six years ago, a woman lit our house on fire while most of my family was inside." Derek jerks his head in what Stiles assumes is the direction of the house. "Her family hunts werewolves, and it's my fault she found out about us. We moved to New York, our uncle went to the hospital, and she went to prison. But now that our uncle, Peter, is well enough again, the lawyers want us to settle on what to do with the estate." His eyebrows are drawn so tightly together that they've nearly merged. "My mother was frustratingly cryptic when she penned her will. The land has to stay in the Hale name, but we have to agree on what to do with it. Laura wants to rebuild the house. Peter wants to develop it, lease it out."

Stiles tilts his head, distantly aware that he must look like a confused seal. But it's a lot to take in. It's no wonder Derek's all... Derek. "Well what do you want to do?" He asks.

He can feel the deep growl emanating from Derek's chest even in the water. "I don't know," he sounds frustrated, like he's been over it a thousand times before.

"Well, what would make you happiest?"

Snorting dismissively, Derek shakes his head, giving Stiles an odd look. He rises and brushes himself off before getting back to work.

The rest of their time goes quietly, the last, quick grains of sand through glass, and Stiles figures Derek's brief sharing spell has passed. Once the only light left is orange and fading, Derek gathers his leather jacket.

"See you tomorrow." It's a statement, but he looks at Stiles inquisitively.

Stiles gives him a thumbs up, and he's leaving before the merman can say anything more.

By the time the murk of night sets in, he's a little giddy, and he's positive that it's not just from the six toaster pastries he'd crammed in his mouth once Derek had left. Among the food bags he'd discovered something called "apple sauce" as well, but found it a little frozen and difficult to eat. Once his belly was full, a familiar jittery feeling settled in his limbs.

Exhaustion, loneliness, and boredom all fight for his attention until he can't seem to focus on anything at all. It's the same feeling that usually got him into trouble. Somehow it was worse here, though, all bottled up with pressure building. No Scott to distract him. Nothing at the bottom of the lake except rocks. Valiantly, he pulls a couple out before he feels like he's shaking out of his skin again, and he rests up on a clean patch of ice, idly slashing at the calm lake with his tail. The water churns when he moves and stills when he stills.

Sometimes he liked to use all of this excess energy to pine over Lydia. To perfect his plan to woo her after she'd warmed up to him. Now, though, the idea held no appeal. Instead, he picks at the ice with a small claw, flaking off the brittle top layer. It had thinned considerably during the heat of the day. He'd be out in no time. Distantly, he thinks he can hear the trickle of water.He tilts his head, listening toward where Derek had worked during the day.

Derek. _I should just go to sleep._ Stiles thinks, attempting to convince himself. _He'll be back tomorrow._ For all the werewolf's surliness, Stiles found himself looking forward to his company more and more as the days passed, and he doubts it's only because of the food he brings. Stiles felt an unlikely mixture of sympathy and envy for the man, despite having only the barest of glimpses into the werewolf's life. He wasn't hard on the eyes, either.

If he's honest with himself, he can admit to considering Derek's chief problem-solving tactic. Though not exceptionally helpful, avoidance at least seemed easier. Getting caught in the lake hadn't been intentional, of course, but a small part of Stiles thinks it may have been a blessing in disguise. Seventeen and about to marry a beautiful girl who barely knew he existed? Yeah, he can think of a few other places he'd like to be in life. It felt so final. And it's almost a relief to know he's not the only one with mixed feelings.

Forehead pressed against the ice for a moment, Stiles fights to calm his breathing. His head feels full, and stillness won't come easily when his tail won't quit lashing and his scales are still so _itchy_. But once he feels calmer, he allows himself to exhale, breath shaky.

Nearby, a vibration along the ice draws Stiles's head up. A large, dark bird stands upon the surface, webbed feet splayed and dark wings outstretched. It has the shape of a shorebird, feathers an oily black, thin, gawky legs, and an awkwardly twisted neck with a pouch at the throat.

"You're out of luck if you're trying to fish here, buddy," he tells the bird. It doesn't seem to catch the humor in his tone, however, as it cocks its head, staring at him with a luminous blue eye.

Tucking its wide wings in to its body, the bird cranes its crooked neck toward the water, so slow and predatory, a contrast to its awkward appearance. Stiles doesn't blink. Doesn't breathe. Instead of lashing out for prey, though, the bird opens its mouth, and, with an ugly gurgling noise, releases a something silvery into the water.

Stiles doesn't think before diving after the silver shape. He has no idea why a bird would spit its dinner up into his pond, but he wants to find out. He swims all the way to the bottom of the lake, and then all around, but finds no sign of the fish at all.

The hunt finally allows him to feel the exhaustion of the day weighing upon him, and, with a bubbly sigh, he settles down into the mud of the lake bottom to shut his eyes.

***

There's a dull headache pounding behind Derek's eyes as he treks back to his car. He presses the heel of his palm to one eye, but is forced to keep the other open if he wants to see where he's going. How did his days keep getting more and more complicated? It used to be him and Laura and his guilt and then their little pack and school and it was good enough to keep him busy.

But he almost likes this better.

He must be some kind of masochist.

True to form, he bypasses his car when he reaches the house, and lets himself in instead. Until now, he'd done his best to avoid everything but the comparatively clean kitchen. But he lets himself explore, now, thankful for his enhanced eyesight in the dark interior.

The floorboards don't so much creak under his boots, as they loudly growl in protest, the wood soft in places where it's not charred. Something moves and Derek's claws slide out before he realizes he's just spooked a possum. He growls at it anyway and watches its ratlike tail disappear through a broken window.

He doesn't really want to touch the railing as he climbs the stairs, steps precarious. Afraid to make it too real; like grabbing a hand-hold will force him to own up to the past six years. When he and Laura stopped by for a look a few days ago, they had stayed on the first floor with the den and the kitchen and the porch and the guest room. At the time, it had been enough for the both of them.

His old room isn't anything like he remembered it. The walls don't look blue. The bed isn't there any more. The built-in shelves are vacant. Under the scent of mold and ash, though, it smells familiar. He can't stay there long.

Drifting down the hall, Derek feels like a ghost. Everything is where it should be - Laura's room, then the bathroom, Cora's and Vera's at the end of the hall - he thinks about going further, toward the master bedroom, but decides against it.

_Happiest_. That's what Stiles had said. What made him happy?

Laura, he guessed. And the rest of the pack. But he doesn't think that's what Stiles meant.

Frustrated with himself, Derek heads back down the stairs and to his car. The air's cold where it hadn't been during the day. Distantly, he can hear a deer back in the garden, foraging amongst the dead plants. In front of him, the air fogs like dragon's breath.

The drive back to the motel is uneventful, and he's barely even parked before Erica's jumping down off the second floor railing and landing gracefully next to his car.

"Someone could see you," he hisses when she backs up and allows him to open his door.

"Nobody did," she assures him with the confidence of a newly bitten wolf. They either went to pieces, or it went to their head.

A couple years after moving to the city, Laura had found Erica and Boyd within a few months of one another. As the only survivors of brutal multiple homicides, their identities were difficult to uncover, minors in the protection of the state. His sister had been determined to locate them, however, before the first full moon after the attacks. He's not sure how his sister convinced both the authorities, as well as the kids in the first place, but they'd had to get a larger apartment before long.

Isaac hadn't been the same. Derek thinks that their alpha had had a bit more influence, there. But he didn't ask questions. Laura was deserving of his trust, and never asked him any questions, either.

Boyd and Isaac climb down the creaky metal and concrete stairs in a less showy fashion before Erica demands Derek take them to get milkshakes, crossing her arms over her chest. It has the cadence of a question, but Derek knows better. His sister is a terrible influence on Erica.

"Why don't you get Laura to take you?" he asks, knowing full well that he's merely biding his time, now.

"She's the one who tried to get us to eat Ethiopian for dinner," Isaac butts in. Erica quirks her lip and lifts her brows at Derek in agreement. Laura had been on an ethnic food kick lately, and the pack had begun to grow weary of dishes they couldn't even pronounce.

Sighing, he unlocks the doors. He hated trying to fit this many in his car.

"Watch the upholstery," he growls.

"Why do you smell like a swamp?"

He has to fight the smile pulling at his lips.

***

"There was a bird last night," Stiles tells Derek over breakfast the next morning.

"Uh huh..." Derek eyes him from his relaxed sprawl on the bank. He'd slept in more than usual after staying out with Isaac, Erica, and Boyd, all three high on the euphoria of winter break and fresh air. The day is shaping up to be just as warm as yesterday and Derek had silently vowed to make the best of it.

Which meant spending his daylight hours taking care of this overgrown goldfish. Or courting him, depending on who you asked.

"Was that before or after," Derek gestures in his direction, "that."

During the night, Stiles had created himself a shallow depression in the bank, free from ice, where he could rest. Quite comfortably, it appeared. Judging from the way the merman's limbs splayed out toward the shore.

"Before. Early this morning before you got here. Leaning up on that ice was wrecking my shoulders," he complains, rubbing one for emphasis. Like Derek hadn't been breaking his own back shoveling ice out of the way.

Derek grunts and busies himself with his breakfast sandwich instead of the ridiculous mermaid.

"It was really weird," Stiles continues. "A big fisher bird, even though there aren't any fish here. Anyway, it spit one out into the lake. But I couldn't find it."

"One what?"

"A fish."

"Right." He'd officially gone stir-crazy. "We'll have you out of there soon," Derek assures him as gently as he can manage.

Stiles flaps a hand at him angrily. "Shut up. It _was_ weird. I've been in here for..." he counts on his long fingers for a moment. "For four days, now. And not once has any kind of animal come near here. Aside from you."

"Thanks."

"You're welcome. So for one to just show up in the middle of the night and barf up a disappearing fish? Little bizarre, don't you think?"

"You were probably dreaming," Derek tells him, crinkling up the fast food wrapper with a note of finality and going to collect Stiles's wrapper in the paper bag.

Stiles slaps him on the boot when he nears, in much closer proximity in his shallow nest, now. Derek makes an indignant noise and considers dropping the wrapper back on the merman's head. He reconsiders, though.

Yesterday, Stiles had looked fine, aside from a few misplaced scales. Today, though, his tail looked a bit shabbier, worn through and mottled. He kept turning, lower half twisting in a boneless, inhuman writhe against the muddy bottom of the bank. Once in a while, Derek thought he could maybe smell blood. It was hard to tell, in the water.

He appeared to be in good spirits, despite the slow disintegration of his skin. Chipper, even. Derek found it unnerving. But, then again, he lost his eyebrows and grew fangs every time he got a little over-angry, so he supposed he wasn't one to talk.

Stowing the fast food bag in an empty grocery bag, Derek figures he should probably start shoveling again. He'd been telling the truth when he promised Stiles he'd be out soon. Probably within the next two days, if they both put their backs into it.

That didn't seem likely on Stiles's end though, the pale man languishing with his torso exposed to the sun.

Derek feels like doing the same. The scent of pine, saltwater, and wet earth all wrapped around him. Usually, he can't do serene. He gets inside his own head too much. But the lull is a powerful call.

Stiles is so still for once that Derek thinks he could probably count the moles on his skin.

He prowls closer to the water, steps quiet. Stiles either doesn't hear him, or simply isn't inclined to look up from where his head is cradled against his arm. His eyes are closed, long lashes fanned across his cheeks, his hair is dried up in seven different directions and it's disconcerting, how human he looks for someone whose skin trailed off into scales at the waistline. Derek doubts that even he can pull that off. It's the scowl, people tell him.

If he really concentrates, he can trick himself into imagining it's not the middle of winter. He's somewhere warm and far away from responsibility.

"So are you just a really bad swimmer, or..."

Derek realizes he's staring. Stiles smirks with a quirk of his pink lips.

"I swim just fine," he says, but when he hears how defensive and childish he sounds, he adds, "I just had a bad experience when I was younger. So I don't like to swim any more."

The look of hurt on Stiles's face makes him want to take the words back. He isn't sure what he's said wrong.

"That's really sad. One bad time shouldn't ruin everything for you," he sinks back into the water, the dark lake swallowing him up to his shoulders.

"It's my own choice," he says, feeling defensive.

"Still," Stiles says, moving further out and treading water with lazy sweeps of his arms. "I think you're missing out. C'mon. I could show you," he suggests brightly.

Casting a weak glare at the man, Derek's shoulders tense. "Pass. That water is cold enough to send a human into shock." Derek doubted that a werewolf's reaction to it would be much more pleasant.

"Next time, though," and the implication has Derek's brows arching. "Next time I pass by. Or do werewolves go on beach trips? That tan's gotta take some kind of maintenance." Stiles grins lewdly at him, and Derek can hardly believe what he's hearing.

"Why would you even want to come back here?" He addresses the least complicated point.

Rolling his eyes so dramatically that he actually gets his hair wet again, Stiles answers. "Well, I may be the one with the unpopular opinion here, but I haven't had such a bad time for being stuck in this dinky lake. The food's good. The water's clean. The conversation..." he tilts one hand from side to side, "so-so. And I've even made a friend!"

Derek snorts.

"Buddy? Pal? Acquaintance? Being that I coexist and share the same oxygen with?"

"Ugh, you're the worst. I take it back." He's still smiling though.

Derek retrieves the shovel, pointedly quiet. "You can't get rid of me that easily," Stiles adds, and Derek exhales loudly. Stiles treats it like a chuckle.

For a few hours, he works with a silent determination. The warmth of the day has the ice slick and slushy under his feet, and he works carefully, grateful he'd worn a t-shirt instead of long sleeves. When large chunks begin breaking off of the mouth of the river, swirling sluggishly into the lake, he feels a bit of savage pride welling in him. As the first piece broke away, he looked to Stiles, but the merman appeared more preoccupied with his scales than with the new bits of ice floating around him.

By noon, Derek had made his way several feet down the river, where it began to widen. He'd done less work in previous days this far down, so the ice was trickier, but still thinner and easier to work with. He strikes downward with the shovel, gritting his teeth in satisfaction when another large section breaks off with a loud _crack_.

"Hey, watch it!"

Stiles swept the ice around him with a hand, sending it on its way. Derek hadn't realized he'd gotten so close, swimming up the river to watch the werewolf's progress. Throwing his head back in an exaggerated eye roll, Derek repeats the motion. The shovel meets some resistance and skitters across the surface, and he wobbles precariously, attempting to maintain his balance.

"Smooth."

"Excuse me for working hard to get you out of here," Derek growls, going back in for the next strike like he has a vendetta against the ice.

Grinning wickedly, Stiles licks at his lower lip. "You go right ahead, fisherman. I'll just be over here supervising." And what the hell is _that_ supposed to mean, Derek wonders before he slips again, the ice behind him cracking suddenly. Everything tilts slightly, and he feels his claws come out, even though there's nothing to grab on to.

Within the space of a blink, Derek's on his back, forced away from the water by a wiry arm around his torso. He wheezes when he hits the hard ground of the riverbank, rock digging into his back while a heavy, wet presence settles along his front.

Brown eyes wide and wild, Stiles looks about as shocked as Derek feels. Slowly, he lifts himself, pinning Derek's shoulders to the ground in the process. His tail slips awkwardly off of Derek's front, rolling to one side gracelessly.

"You were gonna fall in," he explains, wetting his lips again.

Derek grunts faintly as the merman presses against his shoulders, struggling at being a good foot from the water in their awkward tangle of limbs; all the force that had gotten them there useless now. He looks flushed and terrified and _pretty_ and a deep, rarely-used part of Derek's mind, more wolf than man, thinks _prey_ and wants to sink its teeth in. Derek's not sure if it's that or the near-miss that has his heart beating wildly.

"Yeah," he croaks, eloquent. And there's a drip of water clinging to Stiles's upturned nose as he heaves for breath.

He wraps his arm around the merman's back, drawing him back down as he cranes upward, sealing their lips together, warm breath and cold water. It's relief and gratitude and frustration and want. And he isn't sure if it makes him happy, exactly, not yet. But it's impulsive, and it's for him, and when Stiles kisses him back fiercely, it's a start.

**Author's Note:**

> Kudos keep me motivated and let me know that I'm not absolutely miserable at this!


End file.
